


Eyes Wide Shut

by coffeeandcas



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, Claustrophobia, Dreams and Nightmares, Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, Internal Conflict, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Memories, Nightmares, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-07
Updated: 2020-08-07
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:26:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25770574
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coffeeandcas/pseuds/coffeeandcas
Summary: Bucky rarely sleeps. But when he does, the nightmares come.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Comments: 1
Kudos: 40





	Eyes Wide Shut

**Author's Note:**

> This idea is very loosely based on a few chapters of A Short Stay in Hell by Steven L. Peck, which is possibly the best and most haunting short story I've ever read. I adapted it just for Bucky.

Bucky is alone, as always. 

He once thought he knew the meaning of the word ‘alone’. He attributed it to sleeping in his own bed without a companion after an evening out on the town, or managing to find the shower cubicles empty during his military training. Occasionally, it meant wishing Steve were with him, either during art class when Steve’s mom had called in to say he was sick again, or fighting at his side when he was deployed to Europe and Steve was left behind at home. And, very occasionally, it meant hugging his pillow to his chest at night and staring into the darkness, missing someone he didn’t know he needed.

Now, alone means something else. It means fear, it means darkness, it means vulnerability. It means nobody to care for him when he’s injured, nobody to watch his back on a mission, nobody to wonder why he hasn’t come back yet.

Alone means solitude. And not the good kind.

So Bucky is used to various kinds of alone. And ever since Steve plucked him to safety - granted, it was a little more complex than that, but it pains him to dwell on the past - it has taken him a while to adjust to enjoying his own company again (which he rarely does), to finding the shower cubicle empty (which it always is), and to not needing to clutch a pillow to cure the ache, because there’s someone very real there to hold instead (it’s usually the other way around, but Steve doesn’t mind letting Bucky pretend). Alone has come to mean something good, or at the very least it has come to mean something that isn’t agony and terror and bitter, soul-destroying loneliness. 

But tonight is different. He’s alone, walking slowly down a dark corridor, a corridor that seems to have no end. And he’s afraid; the type of afraid that he remembers snatches of from his time with HYDRA. Above him, strip lights attempt to light the way but they flicker and flash, most of the bulbs already blown, so only provide a cursory glow, casting creepy shadows of his own body as he walks. He can hear his own breath, see it coming in repeated puffs before his eyes. It must be cold, but he can’t feel it. He rarely notices the cold, not any more. He struggles to recall the days he once did. 

His feet are bare, as is his chest, and he trails his fingers along the wall as he walks. Brick, rough, badly painted. Black, everything is black. The floor, the walls, the ceiling… and the doors. The doors that line the wall to his right, all locked, all impenetrable even to him. He’s tried. Tried the locks, and there are plenty of them. Tried pulling the padlocks to pieces with his cybernetic arm, tried hammering and kicking the doors down, tried everything to get through them. That was hours ago now, and he’s tried over a hundred doors. He hasn’t had success with a single one.

For a while, there were no doors. Just solid brick on either side of him, and he had to reach out with both arms to make sure the walls weren’t closing in. Because it damn well felt like they were, and he had to stop multiple times to calm his breathing, to touch first one wall and then the other, to push relentlessly at them both just in case, to keep them away from him. He’s been in cages before, he’s been in tiny spaces before, but nothing like this. Never like this,

The fear and resulting anger at finding himself trapped in such an endless rat run had initially presented itself as violence, which fuelled his desire to find out what hid from sight behind the doors. But that has all burned out now and he just walks, on and on, one foot in front of the other, body aching, feet sore, mouth as dry as the hottest desert. He’s been here for hours, days, weeks. It feels like he’s been here forever, walking alone, trapped, possible exits all around him and all inaccessible to him. 

He’s tried calling for help. For Steve, for anyone, even for Tony. If someone other than Steve could find and extract him, Tony could. But his voice just bounced off the walls, echoed down the corridor and away, away, away into the darkness, leaving him with just his own thoughts once more. 

Alone with his thoughts is not a good place for Bucky to be, not these days. He has thoughts, sure. Everyone does, even him. But what he also has, in abundance, are memories. 

A train, moving at top speed through white-peaked mountains. Steve’s eyes, the night before, warm and inviting. Falling, watching the mountains touch the sky as his body plummeted into oblivion. A snapshot of Steve’s horrified face. Pain like no other as he’s dragged through the snow. 

The screech of metal instruments, nerve pain shooting through every inch of his skin, phantom sensation in fingers that are no longer there. Begging, pleading, desperate, howling for a reprieve as agony pushes him to the brink of consciousness. 

Men in uniform dragging him across icy cold rooms, throwing him into cages barely big enough to house an animal. Waking in his own piss and sweat, not sleeping for days, passing out and coming to and not knowing how much time he’s lost. 

Being put on ice when he’s exhausted his usefulness. 

Pistols and handguns equipped with silencers. Blood splatters at his feet, streaks of it on his arms, his face. Wiping it away and feeling nothing more than irritation. Bones breaking beneath his hands, sometimes clean breaks and sometimes shards piercing skin, shredding muscle and ligament, fat layers protruding through the tears, shrieks of agony clawing at his ears. Emotionless, detached, observing the wounds he inflicts as though watching it through the eyes of another. Caring not for the pleas for mercy, the information divulged, the men and women begging for their lives and the lives of their loved ones. 

Crushing those lives into nothing in his fists.

The faces of those he’s killed and their families, burned into his retinas for all eternity.

Men, women, children, fathers, mothers, children…

Parents...

Tony Stark’s parents…

The anger returns full force, a red haze descending in front of his vision without warning, and the sound that rips itself from his throat is animalistic and bounces around the corridor, growing in volume and intensity until he’s forced to cover his ears to block it out - but it carries on, on and on inside his head and his teeth are clenched so tightly he’s in danger of cracking them. He’s dropped into a crouch, panic tightening his chest and making it hard to draw breath and he can see bloody footprints on the floor, not his own, smaller, a child’s. A memory? Or something new? The sound goes on, echoing, louder, and with a wild cry of desperation he launches himself at the nearest door, fists pounding on the solid wood, fingernails scratching desperately at the paint until he draws blood, yanking at the padlock with his metal arm until he crushes it - but it won’t snap free. Frustration spills over into fear, panic bleeding in, and he drops to his knees before the door, fists still pounding fruitlessly above his head, eyes screwed shut against the approaching wave of utter despair. The sound of his cries has waned now, the echo still fading into the far distance, and he rests his forehead against the door, trying to push away bitter tears by sheer force of will.

He doesn’t cry. He never cried, not once, in HYDRA’s care. He won’t start now. He  _ won’t… _

He stands, breathing hard through his mouth, every muscle wound tight and he twists his head from side to side in an attempt to loosen the tension. Then, just as he’s about to begin his walking again...

“Bucky.” 

He stops moving, instantly still, every sense on high alert. A voice, a voice saying a name. His name. Bucky. He thought he’d heard it earlier, a long while ago, but had dismissed it as his own thoughts playing tricks on him. But that, that was a voice, for sure. A voice speaking his name, addressing him. Whoever sent him here knows him, knows his name and what? What more do they know? Is it HYDRA, come to steal him away again and turn him into the monster he knows he still is? Is it Pierce, come to wake him from stasis and about to tell him that his life with Steve in Stark Tower has all been one long, lovely dream? Is it Tony, laughing at him?

No, he corrects himself instantly. Tony would never do that. They aren’t friends, far from it. But they aren’t enemies either, and Tony would help if he saw him here. He would rescue him, not stand back and jeer. 

He doesn’t dare hope that it could be Steve. 

He listens hard, so hard that it physically hurts, but nothing else comes. So he takes a step, intends to start walking once more since there’s nothing else to do, but the voice returns, louder this time, and a hand comes down onto his shoulder so firmly that he jerks violently in response. He spins, ready to confront whoever has managed to creep up on him - but only empty space stares back. The painted brick wall to the right, a black, sealed door to his left. And a long, endless corridor which he’s been walking down for as long as he can remember.

“Bucky. Bucky!”

Not ‘James’. Not ‘Sergeant Barnes’. Not the asset’. Bucky. His name. And that voice…

The word echoes up the corridor to meet him and he spins again, searching for the source. His body tingles, his good arm feeling swarmed by pins and needles, and his chest tightens as panic looms. Someone, some _ thing _ is coming…

“ _ Bucky…” _

He blinks, and the room swims before him, cracks starting to appear in the walls, chasms opening up in the floor, and bright, pale light seeping in, blinding him. He holds his breath, tries to keep his eyes open against the increasing glare, but eventually is forced to close them and that’s when he feels it - a hand on his shoulder, warm, familiar, holding him tight and shaking him. He doesn’t open his eyes. The smell, that’s familiar as well. Warm, something with a deep oak undertone and rich spices. Musky beneath that. He knows that smell, knows it so well that he inhales deeply, clinging to it, silently pleading for it to envelop him and take him away from this place that holds him captive. He still doesn’t open his eyes. Then, a voice. Close by, in his ear, low and firm and insistent, calling his name, hot breath stroking his skin.

“Bucky. Buck. Come on, wake up. Come back to me.  _ Bucky _ .”

“Steve.” His mouth is dry and he has to lick his lips twice before managing to get the word out in any intelligible manner. “Steve.”

“I’m here.” The hand on his shoulder moves, rubs a slow line down his spine then back up to the nape of his neck, into his hair, brushing it away from his face and the breath on his cheek becomes more than that. A kiss, chaste and sweet, to the bolt of his jaw. He scrunches his eyes closed even tighter, so tight that red spots appear in the blackness. “I’m here, Buck. It’s only a nightmare, I swear.”

He doesn’t dare look, not yet. He’s still a little bit trapped, back there in the corridor with only his twisted thoughts for company. It seems too much to hope that it wasn’t real. It  _ felt _ real. How could a nightmare feel so real? But the corridor has faded now, the details blurred into obscurity and all he can see is the cool, soothing blackness of his closed eyelids. No doors, no cracking paintwork, no endless eternity of isolation and fear. He isn’t there. Which means...

He opens his eyes and turns slowly onto his back in the same breath, and the relief that floods his body makes him feel dizzy in its wake. He’s in his bedroom,  _ their _ bedroom in Stark Tower, and it’s a beautifully sunny morning. The curtains are partially open, swaying in the breeze from the open window, the smell of fresh coffee hangs warmly in the air, and Steve is sitting on the edge of the bed looking at him with an affectionate mixture of comfort and concern. His hand has moved now from Bucky’s hair to his chest, still stroking in circles, and Bucky lets an audible breath out through his teeth. His human hand comes up to rub his eyes, fingers digging into the corners to clear away the remnants of dried tears and flashes of impenetrable doors. He must be pressing too hard as Steve takes his wrist gently and moves his hand away. 

“Hey,” Steve says, his eyes soft, and Bucky’s mouth twitches into a smile of its own accord.

“Hey.” Then, “Sorry.”

“Don’t.” Steve squeezes his fingers tightly. “I’ve told you, don’t. It’s not your fault, and they’re worse for you than they are for me.”

“Yeah. Alright.”

They go through this every time Bucky wakes from a nightmare. He apologises, Steve refuses to accept it, he nods and understands why. Steve usually brings him coffee in bed - there it is, already made, sitting on the bedside table in a mug with a large letter ‘B’ on it, a souvenir from when Tony went to Las Vegas - then they sit and cuddle together for a while. Sometimes they watch a movie on the flatscreen TV that appears as if by magic out of the foot of the bed, and sometimes they just sit quietly together. Steve reads, Bucky listens to songs on his headphones and tries to decipher what passes for popular music these days.

“Did I wake you?” He murmurs, hauling himself into a sitting position and pushing the covers away. It’s warm and there’s a fine layer of sweat on his skin. He could use a shower.

“No. You were fine when I got up. I went for a run, came back and started breakfast, then I heard you.” Steve runs a hand through his hair and Bucky allows it, only pulling away when Steve takes a little too long. It’s just a thing he does, shying away from too much contact, and Steve accepts it willingly in the way only Steve can. He’s better than he was, and one day maybe he can stand more than just a kiss and a hug. One day, maybe he and Steve can… He cuts off his own thoughts, feeling his cheeks warm. Steve has had longer to adjust to this world than he has. In his world, back when Frank Sinatra was on the radio and he took girls out dancing, his feelings for Steve had to stay locked up tight. It’s just taking a bit of time to get used to sharing them. To imagining himself and his best friend as more than just buddies, as two men who kiss and cuddle and care about each other as more than friends usually do. As a couple. A pair. As, to use Steve’s word, soulmates. 

“Hey,” Steve’s thumb draws lazy circles on his wrist. It feels nice. He knows Bucky is sinking back into his thoughts and is adept at drawing him back. “I’ll finish breakfast. You want a shower? Then we can do whatever you want.” He glances towards the windows. “It’s nice out. Maybe a walk in the park?”

“Yeah. Maybe.”

Bucky hauls himself to his feet and, in a moment of bravery, envelops Steve in a tight hug. Steve’s arms come up and around him and they hold each other tightly, a million unsaid things passing between them as Steve’s warm, clean body presses against Bucky’s tightly-wound, sweaty one. Steve smells spicy and familiar and everything good, and Bucky buries his nose in his neck, inhaling deeply and feeling Steve’s laugh shudder through both of them.

“Love you, Buck,” Steve murmurs into his hair and Bucky blinks in response. It doesn’t come easily to Steve, saying that. There’s still a little bit of the 1940s lurking in Steve Rogers, and although he tells Bucky he loves him with regularity, it’s not with the natural air that it might have been had they both been born fifty years later. 

“Mhm, alright.” Bucky disentangles himself from Steve and walks away without looking at him, heading for the bathroom. He hears Steve laugh breathily behind him as he goes. It’s a happy sound, a relieved sound, a sound that both acknowledges that Bucky can’t say it back yet understands that the words are there. They’re just beneath the surface, curling contentedly around his heart, and one day might be spoken into reality between them. 

But not just yet.

He closes the bathroom door, leans in to turn the shower on (he still can’t get over how powerful it is, how good the jets feel when they pummel the tension out of his sore shoulders), and strips naked. It’s only when he presses his ear to the door that he can hear Steve back in the kitchen, singing tunelessly along to something on the radio and clanging pans around as he no doubt tries not to burn whatever he’s made them both for breakfast.

Bucky presses both palms to the closed door, and looks at them. One flesh and blood, the knuckles with slight dents in them and the nails trimmed neat and short. Fine hairs on the back of his wrist, growing thicker and darker down his arm. And the metal one, the physical embodiment of his past and the things he’s done that have brought him to where he is today. Past and present. Human and not so much. Lover, fighter, and everything in between.

In the silence of the bathroom, amid the steam clouds that slowly rise up around him, Bucky whispers huskily to the closed bathroom door, “I love you too, Steve.”

And he hopes that somehow, Steve has heard him. 


End file.
